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The far Left continues to believe American voters are not smart enough to grasp the diversionary tactics it employs to distract us from the issues our President just doesn’t want to talk about – issues that affect us all every day and must be addressed.

Exhibit A in these diversionary tactics is an absurd new attack ad President Obama has released taking my comments out of context. I’m not running for any office, but I’m more than happy to accept the dubious honor of being Barack Obama’s “enemy of the week” if that includes the opportunity to debate him on the issues Americans are actually concerned about. (Remember when I said you don’t need a title to make a difference?)

Just off the top of my head, a few of these concerning issues include: a debt crisis that has us hurdling towards a Greek-style collapse, entitlement programs going bankrupt, a credit downgrade for the first time in our history, a government takeover of the health care industry that makes care more expensive and puts a rationing panel of faceless bureaucrats between you and your doctor (aka a “death panel”), $4 and $5 gas at the pump exacerbated by an anti-drilling agenda that rejects good paying energy sector jobs and makes us more dependent on dangerous foreign regimes, a war in Afghanistan that seems unfocused and unending, a global presidential apology tour that’s made us look feeble and ridiculous, a housing market in the tank, the longest streak of high unemployment since World War II, private-sector job creators and industry strangled by burdensome regulations and an out-of-control Obama EPA, an attack on the Constitutional protection of religious liberty, an attack on private industry in right-to-work states, crony capitalism run amok in an administration in bed with their favored cronies to the detriment of genuine free market capitalism, green energy pay-to-play kickbacks to Obama campaign donors, and a Justice Department still stonewalling on a bungled operation that armed violent Mexican drug lords and led to the deaths of hundreds of innocent people. More

Sarah Palin proposed eliminating all corporate taxes in her speech to the Iowa Tea Party today. This is HUGE. The ripple effect of putting this in place would affect a vast swath of corporate America, in addition to eliminating crony-capitalism.

Consider for a moment all those that would be affected by such a policy. Corporate tax attorneys, CPA firms and countless tax department employees would lurch to a halt in their jobs. The focus of countless corporate controllers would shift from tax avoidance to net income maximization.

Countless corporate lobbyists would be out of a job overnight. Their corporate benefactors would pull the plug on their funding immediately. The focus of corporations would turn away from Washington, DC in a heartbeat.

Companies that have relied on government largess to support their bottom lines would be horrified. Weaknesses in governance would be exposed overnight as the SEC would mandate that companies disclose any risk in their business plans beyond company guarantors. GM and Chrysler would suffer a major downgrade in their stock valuation because the federal government would no longer underwrite and support their operations.

In a word, the free-market would explode! Risk-taking would suddenly be in vogue again and entrepreneurs would be empowered to invest. There would be a massive shift of cash out of savings into new endeavors. Corporations would scramble to find fitting investments for their stockpiles of cash. The value of small companies would skyrocket as these investment dollars would be looking for a good return and compete for the best ideas.

The downside? Washington politicians would immediately demonize the idea as a major impediment to deficit reduction, as if they’ve ever cared about that in the past. The caterwauling about reduced revenues for Washington would be deafening! If such a policy was implemented, we would watch Washington pundits undergo convulsions as they began to realize how their lives would be impacted. There would be no incentive for ANYONE involved in business to pay attention to them.

Sarah Palin has opened Pandora’s box with her proposal to end corporate taxation. I am anxious to see the effects of her proposal on other Republican nominees, especially in next week’s debate.

While doing nothing but address a Tea Party event in Iowa, Sarah Palin has turned the 2012 election upside down. Now that’s what I call an unconventional campaign!

Take it from a guy who lived large during the Reagan years. Jobs were plentiful and the capital market ran like an open faucet. The sky was the limit. Today, jobs are scarce and the capital market faucet barely drips. From the new reality that is Obama’s America today comes a new class of voter (a new demographic if you will): the unemployed.

I brought up Reagan because it’s important to work with a frame of reference. Knowing what I know about Sarah Palin, I don’t see why she couldn’t bring this country to the type of prosperity we saw when Ronaldus Maximus was president. I explain it all here, here and here.

In forging a winning coalition, there is a large and growing swath of voters that can be courted. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, 13.9 million Americans are officially unemployed. According to Gallup, the Unemployment / Underemployment rate is 18.3%. According to The Huffington Post, there are nearly 5 million more who aren’t even being counted in these numbers. If I had to give you an honest rough estimate (and not lie to you like the government is lying to you), I’d have to tell you that there are about 25 million Americans either unemployed or underemployed. That’s a lot of voters.

Will all those people vote for Sarah Palin? No. Should they all vote for Sarah Palin? Yes. Ronald Reagan created 16.1 million jobs between 1981 and 1989. Now ask yourself, is something like this possible again if a President Palin removes regulatory burdens for businesses, reforms the tax code, reforms entitlements, repeals Obamacare and opens up energy drilling and exploration (where our real wealth is currently stored)? You friggin betcha it is.

It’s time to get the message out to the millions of Americans who have lost their jobs and homes because of the moronic policies of our leaders in Washington that if they channel their anger and their desire to restore America the right way, they can be a driving force behind ending the Obama sickness that has befallen our great nation.

I can only speak for myself in this although I’m sure I’m not alone by saying that I firmly believe not just anyone else other than President Obama “will do”. This coming election isn’t about an alternative but about THE alternative. And you, Ms. Palin, are THE… antithesis and THE anecdote all at the same time.. I don’t pretend to elevate you to an unreasonably high status…I simply see that you are uniquely equipped to lead us during a time perhaps like no other. You see clearly when others don’t. The other so-called contenders simply don’t stack up. All of us who aren’t blinded by special interests, ivory tower theoreticals and lefty MSM bias see this for what it is.

Neither of us want to place the burden of our problems on the shoulders of Governor Palin. But, we believe strongly that she can deliver the type of leadership as president that would create the kind of environment of prosperity that we Americans have come to count on as we take responsibility for our own personal situations.

All we are asking is for the government to get out of the way, stop screwing up our lives with their idiotic decisions and to let the free market operate the way its supposed to. Remove government’s heavy hand and its bureacratic cogs from our economic engine and the millions of Americans who are going through what Kunta and I are going through will be able to find jobs on our own.

They key to ending this Obama nation is to vote him out and replace him with a real leader in Sarah Palin. We’ll do the rest.

– by Josh Painter
*
In 1992 incumbent president George H. W. Bush, despite enjoying relatively strong approval ratings as high as 89 percent right after the Gulf war, was deprived of a second term in large part thanks to one man, but it wasn’t Bill Clinton or H. Ross Perot. Although Perot’s independent effort did its damage, analysis of Perot voters shows that the damage he did affected Bush and Clinton in proportions not sufficiently out of balance to have made the difference for Clinton:

Perot’s voters voted overwhelmingly for Democratic Governor candidates, and only marginally in favor of the Republican candidates for the House and Senate. Perot’s voters favored Republican Senate candidates by 2.28%, and Republican House candidates by 2.69%. Because Perot’s voters were only 1/5th of the total, that translates into about another 500,000 votes or 0.5% for Bush if they had voted in a two way presidential race the same way they voted for the Senate and House. That is about 1/7th of the margin by which Bush lost.

If Perot cost Bush the election, the proof must lie somewhere else. On a statistical basis, it’s essentially impossible to make a case for Perot costing Bush the 1992 presidential election. The election results show that Perot took many voters from Clinton among his supporters who demonstrated a low interest in politics by voting only for President and Governor, while taking marginally from Bush among those who demonstrated more commitment by casting ballots for Congress.

As for Clinton, he was mostly remembered for his rambling speech at the DNC convention four years earlier, a marathon address which was cheered when it was over mostly because it was finally over. Otherwise, he was relatively unknown on the national stage before primary season began. He quickly gained notoriety, however, and not in a good way, when allegations of his affairs began to surface in the press. There were also rumors of draft-dodging and marijuana use floating around about Clinton, and the Bush team decided to push hard on the character issue. But Clinton’s moral failings were scarcely a minor blip on voters’ radar screens. According to exit polling, something else was foremost on the minds of the electorate. 75% had said that the economy was Fairly Bad or Very Bad. After having pledged, “Read my lips, no new taxes,” in a 1988 campaign speech, Bush later became concerned with the rising federal deficit and agreed to a budget compromise with Congress to raise taxes in the mistaken belief that higher taxes would reduce the deficit. The Clinton campaign flooded the airwaves with a series of ads which showed Bush repeatedly asking the American people to read his lips, while Clinton was on the campaign trail slamming the incumbent for raising taxes. Ironically, the net effect was to make the same voters who seemed uninterested in character issues begin to question Bush’s honesty.

So who was the man who denied George H.W. Bush a second term? It was Clinton strategist James Carville, who never doubted for a minute that the recession and its impact on the electorate were the keys to a Clinton victory. To insure that everyone in the Clinton War Room — including both Clinton and Carville himself — was on the same book and page, the aide had hand-written a list on a white board and hung it on the wall. It read:

1. Change vs. more of the same
2. The economy, stupid
3. Don’t forget healthcare

Nearly two decades later, 70 percent of voters now say the country is on the wrong track, and 57 percent disapprove of the way Obama has handled the economy. The lesson here practically writes itself. We’re no fans of Carville. Our memories of him scurrying from network interview to network interview during the 2008 RNC convention with a blown-up photo of the modest structure that is Wasilla City Hall babbling on about how “dat don’t look like no gubmint building. Dat look like a bait stand in south Luzianna” still rankles. We don’t agree with much of what he has to say most of the time, but in the run up to the 1992 election, Carville was right as rain after a long Texas drought about the economy and how to exploit the issue.

It’s the economy again, stupid. It’s not about where Barack Obama was born, and it’s not about any social issue, at least in the minds of the voters. They aren’t just concerned about the economy, they’re very worried about it. So economic issues — whether it’s the price of gasoline and other goods and services, the federal deficit, looming inflation, the budget, the debt ceiling, the housing market, and what Vice President Biden referred to as a “three letter word – j-o-b-s” — are the keys to making sure Obama’s further presidential ambitions will suffer the same fate as those of Bush41 twenty years ago. Just reminding voters of these issues won’t be enough, of course. The successful GOP candidate will have to present real solutions to these fiscal problems, solutions which voters believe will work.

If and when Sarah Palin gets into the 2012 race for president, James Carville’s short list of three items should be plastered all over the walls at her election headquarters.

1. Change vs. more of the same

Carville’s first point can be very effectively driven home by taking a page out of Ronald Reagan’s playbook. The governor should ask voters in every stump speech, “Are you better off now than you were four years ago?” Most aren’t, so they will pay attention when she explains how she can make things better.

2. The economy, stupid

She can pound away at Obama as the bus driver who’s got the economy headed over a cliff. She already knows from the 2008 election that voters don’t care who he used to hang out with, where he was born, or how much of a deranged Marxist his former pastor is. They’re all valid points to conservatives, but the larger electorate tuned out and didn’t listen last time, just as they weren’t interested in Clinton’s character in 1992, and they’re not likely to want to hear such talk now. But if she talks about the pain at the pump, when filling up the family ride takes the lion’s share of a $100 dollar bill, it will hit home. So will talk of higher prices and smaller servings at the grocery store and the the family’s favorite restaurants. Abortion is an issue close to the governor’s heart, and justifiably so. But talking about how domestic drilling makes us more energy secure and has the side benefit of creating jobs will resonate with the voters, while condemning Planned Parenthood will only make their eyes glaze over. To be able to appoint justices who will strike down Roe. v Wade, she will have to first get elected, and managing the debate over the economy successfully will go a long way toward helping her to do that.

3. Don’t forget healthcare

This one takes on a whole new meaning now that ObamaCare has been rammed through. The results of a poll released April 18 show that this is still an unpopular measure, with 52 percent of Americans in favor of its repeal. But the issue is strongly tied to the economy, and treating it not just as a matter of government intrusion, but as an economic issue as well will hit home with voters if they understand how ObamaCare will affect their lives and those of their family members. For many Americans, their aging parents will be ill served by ObamaCare, while their children will have to pay for it.

Staying focused on the economy will require no small measure of campaign discipline of Gov. Palin and her team, but the rewards will be great. She will need some well-defined plans which she can present as white papers on energy, health care, debt and the deficit, the budget, jobs and much more. But we don’t doubt that she is capable of doing this and building a team of problem-solvers to help her.

– by Josh Painter
*
Timing is everything, as the old saying goes, and no political issue depends on timing as much as that of energy. When prices for gasoline at the pump are high, energy climbs to the top of the electorate’s list of concerns, but when prices are low, people tend not to think about it. If the price at the pump continues to climb and stays high through the summer, it will be very much on the minds of voters. And that will play to the strength of Sarah Palin’s hand, as Scott Conroy recently observed at RealClearPolitics:

It would be difficult for Palin’s GOP rivals, and even her Democratic critics, to deny that energy issues fall directly into the wheelhouse of the former Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commissioner who went on to lead a state where almost 90 percent of the budget is funded by oil revenue. As Tina Fey might say, Palin can see oil pipelines from her house.

During an appearance on Fox News last weekend, Palin nodded in anticipation and smiled confidently as host Jeanine Pirro lined up a question about what the government should do about rising gas prices.

Speaking with unbridled relish, Palin replied that opening the strategic oil reserves was not the solution to the problem and reverted to her old mantra that the government should “drill here and drill now” before going into a more in-depth criticism of the Obama administration’s energy policies.

“Back in ’08, our U.S. crude also was trading at about $100 a barrel as it is today for about six months, and that was right before our world economy imploded,” Palin said. “And now here we are back again, so [Obama’s] timing – his destructive timing – of locking up 97 percent of our off-shore and not allowing ANWR to be touched, not allowing domestic drilling to take place to the degree that it should, it is terrifying where he is leading us in terms of being at the mercy of foreign regimes that would seek our demise to produce energy for us.”

[…]

As Palin continues to generate criticism from those who frequently suggest that she has not demonstrated a thorough understanding of the issues facing the country, the energy topic could offer a prime opportunity for her to prove them wrong.

As she continues to mull a presidential run, Palin figures to take particular note that energy issues figure to loom especially large in the nation’s first voting state of Iowa.

Her link points to this Investors.com article showing the results of its latest poll, which clearly demonstrates that Americans’ attitudes about domestic drilling are very much in sync with what she has been saying for years:

With the price of gas up 39 cents at the pump in a month and heading higher amid turmoil in much of the Middle East, Americans wonder why the U.S. isn’t doing more to exploit its own oil resources.

They favor drilling in territorial waters, 67%-29%, according to a new IBD/TIPP poll. That is up from 61%-30% from last May and 64%-25% when Republicans touted drilling in the 2008 election as oil topped $147 a barrel.

There’s also been a solid shift toward drilling in Alaska’s Arc tic National Wildlife Refuge, with support at 54%-40%. That’s up from 49%-43% last year.

A solid 65%-21% favor tapping federal shale reserves in states like Colorado, Wyoming and Utah, off just slightly from May.

“Americans understand we rely heavily on oil imported from the Middle East and the recent events cause concern and uncertainties in their minds,” said Raghavan Mayur, president of Technometrica Market Intelligence, which conducted the poll.

Though most Americans relate to the energy issue as an economic one, Gov. Palin has often pointed out that energy trancends the economy. It is a national security issue. Our military depends on a stable source of petroleum products to fuel jets, tanks, trucks and many of its ships. When that supply is interrupted, the military can’t move. That’s why our national strategic petroleum reserve exists. It’s there for the military to draw from if its supply is suddenly cut off or significantly reduced. It’s not there to tap every time prices get near or above the four dollar level, something Sarah Palin understands, but President Obama does not.

Energy security is one more reason why our nation sorely needs a national energy plan which draws on “all of the above” sources, but includes a serious commitment to explore and produce much more oil and natural gas domestically. Besides, we could use the jobs which would be created, addressing another key concern on the minds of the electorate.

Sarah Palin’s opportunity of a lifetime may have just pulled up to the gasoline pump, and it has to weigh heavily on her decision to run or not to run. No other candidate for 2012 knows this issue as well as she, and it’s a club she can use to beat up on an incumbent president who has done nothing to reduce energy prices or increase domestic production, so beholden is he to the green lobby. High oil prices are knocking on that door of opportunity she has spoken of, and her time to make history may be waiting on the other side.

Institutionalizing Crony Capitalism

Yesterday at 10:28pm

In the wake of the recent financial meltdown, Americans know that we need reform. Not only have many individuals learned lessons about personal responsibility through this, but we’ve been able to engage in a discussion about government’s appropriate role.

The current debate over financial reform demonstrates what happens when political leaders react to a crisis with a raft of new regulations. First off, the people involved in writing government regulations are often lobbyists from the very industry that the new laws are supposed to regulate, and that’s been the case here. It should surprise no one that financial lobbyists are flocking to DC this week. Of course, the big players who can afford lobbyists work the regulations in their favor, while their smaller competitors are left out in the cold. The result here are regulations that institutionalize the “too big to fail” mentality.

Moreover, the financial reform bill gives regulators the power to pick winners and losers, institutionalizing their ability to decide “which firms to rescue or close, and which creditors to reward and how.” Does anyone doubt that firms with the most lobbyists and the biggest campaign donations will be the ones who get seats in the lifeboat? The president is trying to convince us that he’s taking on the Wall Street “fat cats,” but firms like Goldman Sachs are happy with federal regulation because, as one of their lobbyists recently stated, “We partner with regulators.”

They seem to have a nice relationship with the White House too. Goldman showered nearly a million dollars in campaign contributions on candidate Obama. In fact, J.P. Freire notes that President Obama received about seven times more money from Goldman than President Bush received from Enron. Of course, it’s not just the donations; it’s the revolving door. You’ll find the name Goldman Sachs on many an Obama administration résumé, including Rahm Emanuel’s and Tim Geithner’s chief of staff’s.

We need to be on our guard against such crony capitalism. We fought against distortion of the market in Alaska when we confronted “Big Oil,” or more specifically some of the players in the industry and in political office, who were taking the 49th state for a ride. My administration challenged lax rules that seemed to allow corruption, and we even challenged the largest corporation in the world at the time for not abiding by provisions in contracts it held with the state. When it came time to craft a plan for a natural gas pipeline, we insisted on transparency and a level playing field to insure fair competition. Our reforms helped reduce politicians’ ability to play favorites and helped clean up corruption. We set up stricter oversight offices and ushered through a bi-partisan ethics reform bill. Far from being against necessary reform, I embrace it.

Not only was Abdul Farouk Umar Abdulmutallab on several watch lists, and from a real hotbed of al Qaeda terrorist activity, the guy’s own father warned the embassy that his son had become radicalized by militant Islamic fanatics. Never mind Abdul showed up with no luggage, tried to board with no passport, and paid for the one-way ticket to Detroit in cash. Who goes to Detroit without a ticket out of there anyway?

As bad as all of this is though, and this is a serious indictment on our entire terror fighting process, it also highlights another issue, energy independence.

Long before Sarah Palin made “death panels” a household word, long before she was even picked as the John McCain’s running mate, Sarah made energy independence a centerpiece of her message, her career. Sarah didn’t just talk the talk either, within hours of stepping into her new office as the Governor of Alaska, she began working on making the decades long dream of a natural gas pipeline to the lower 48 a reality.

It was Sarah’s dream to get Alaska’s 100’s of trillions of cubic feet of clean burning natural gas out of the ground and into use. She was able to work out all of the issues and now the pipeline is on track to become a reality.

Of course, Sarah’s message on energy independence isn’t just an economic one. Now it’s true, we send between $700 billion and $1 trillion dollars annually overseas. The problem is many times it’s to nations that not only hate us, but use our own dollars to fund efforts to undermine us as a nation. In other words, they use our dollars to fund terror, world wide, against the United States, and our allies.

Even worse, we are forced to act gingerly, even timidly, on many issues, lest we cause major problems with big oil producing nations like Saudi Arabia. We make those guys mad, and they can shut us off, or raise prices to the moon, destroying our already devastated economy. (That is if Obama and the rest of the democrat/communists don’t beat them to it!)

Brian Ross, from ABC News, has this little gem on two of the planners of the Christmas Day attack:

Two al Qaeda Leaders Behind Northwest Flight 253 Terror Plot Were Released by U.S.

Two of the four leaders allegedly behind the al Qaeda plot to blow up a Northwest Airlines passenger jet over Detroit were released by the U.S. from the Guantanamo prison in November, 2007, according to American officials and Department of Defense documents. Al Qaeda claimed responsibility for the Northwest bombing in a Monday statement that vowed more attacks on Americans.

American officials agreed to send the two terrorists from Guantanamo to Saudi Arabia where they entered into an “art therapy rehabilitation program” and were set free, according to U.S. and Saudi officials.

Guantanamo prisoner #333, Muhamad Attik al-Harbi, and prisoner #372, Said Ali Shari, were sent to Saudi Arabia on Nov. 9, 2007, according to the Defense Department log of detainees who were released from American custody. Al-Harbi has since changed his name to Muhamad al-Awfi.

Art therapy rehabilitation program. Really? Who’s running our war on terror efforts, Pee Wee Herman? This of course, just points out the absurdity of our entire approach to this issue. It should also be the final nail in Obama’s grand scheme to move Gitmo to Chicagoland, and make his corrupt buddies richer off of tax payer dollars that it will take to basically convert an unused prison into a “supermax” job.

There are issues with much of the Middle East, for sure, but by far, Saudi Arabia is the biggest problem, and a hot bed for radicals. Well funded radicals. But we are powerless, because we need them for the oil they have, so we must “play nice” with them.

There are other nations, such as Venezuela, who are teaming up with bad actors like Iran, and Russia, forming alliances that will further weaken the United States, and her allies. These relationships will also allow Venezuelan dictator Hugo Chavez to exert power over weaker South American states, thus spreading communism and further destroying what freedoms people in that region have. It will be a disaster.

I know Obama and his group of thugs, along with Al Gore, the Bernie Madoff of the climate change hoaxers, are doing their level best to keep Americans from using their own God given natural resources, all in an effort to enrich themselves, and their friends, by lying to the American people.

First they create a “crisis” in the name of the totally laughable claim of “global warming,” then, they just so happen to have ready made solutions, and the promises of completely non-existent “green jobs” that will “grow the economy,” if only we will allow them to destroy the one we have now.

These are really just schemes to enrich themselves, and their closest friends. We’ve already written about the Chicago Climate Exchange an already in place carbon credit trading scheme, where billions of dollars worth of carbon credits will be traded on the open market. Owing to the fact this thing is in Chicago, does one even need to ask if there is any corruption, or “friends of Obama” involved in this deal?

Al Gore has already made millions off of his hoax, and stands to make billion through the cap and trade schemes. Past that, big Obama supporters like General Electric, which owns NBC/Universal, will also clean up, so to speak, as they make many of the implements of the global warming scam.

Energy: Earlier this year, Congress approved a scheme to pour $80 billion — on top of the tens of billions already spent — into renewables. A government report released last week indicates the money will be wasted.

Renewable energy is the shiny gem that everyone wants but no one can have. Not even a president. Campaigning last year in Lansing, Mich., President Barack Obama said that it was his goal for the U.S. to generate 10% of its electric power from renewable sources by 2012 and 25% by 2025. But he cannot, by the force of will or executive order, change the laws of physics and economics.

America has long relied on fossil fuels to power its economy. Oil, natural gas and coal provide about 84% of the nation’s energy.

And for good reason. They are plentiful and typically easy to retrieve, and, consequently, cheap.

At the other end of the spectrum are renewable sources such as solar, wind, biomass and geothermal. They supply only about 4% of our energy, the remainder coming from hydro and nuclear power.

An axis of environmentalists and Democrats want to change this ratio, because, according to the usual complaint, we depend too heavily on the fossil fuels that emit carbon dioxide.

Trouble is, the market for renewables is poor. Few want to use the inefficient, unreliable and expensive sources. But that hasn’t slowed the renewable energy campaign, which has succeeded in persuading the public that renewables are a sensible energy source and convincing Congress to fund supporters’ daydreams.

The government can continue to “invest” in renewables, and the dreamers will keep using public money to find the magic formula. But little will change over the next 25 years.

The federal Energy Information Administration’s Annual Energy Outlook says in 2035, demand for liquid fuels will increase by almost 10% over 2008 levels, natural gas by nearly 7% and coal by 12%.

While use of renewables will increase as well — by 81%, including hydropower — they will still be unable to unseat our dominant energy source. Fossil fuels’ share of consumption will fall by only six percentage points, from 84% to 78% by 2035. Renewables will provide about 8%.

It’s clear that renewables, which have benefited from government subsidies far in excess of what fossil fuels have received, can’t compete in today’s market and won’t be faring much better a quarter century from now, according to the government’s own reckoning.

It’s just as clear that throwing taxpayers’ dollars at renewables has produced little progress.

Spain provides perhaps the best lesson. The government there has spent $43 billion on solar energy projects, yet solar provides less than 1% of the country’s electric power. It was a bad investment.

Chasing the wind is just as ineffective. When Congress temporarily eliminated wind power credits in 1999, 2001 and 2003, the number of new turbine projects fell sharply. The Texas Public Policy Foundation says that providing a modest level of wind power in that state would cost taxpayers at least $60 billion through 2025.

Biomass is also a poor substitute. It’s both primitive — its sources are wood and trash — and an environmental nightmare, devouring in some cases as much as 10 times the land mass than needed to create a wind farm. And wind farms themselves are big land eaters.

Geothermal energy, considered “free” energy from the earth, is also a space eater that requires heavy capital investment, which is often hard to recoup. In California earlier this month, a geothermal project was abandoned, despite a $6 million grant from the Energy Department and roughly $30 million in venture capital.

Geothermal has, as well, some environmental drawbacks. The day before the California project was closed, Swiss government officials permanently shut down a geothermal project in Basel because, the New York Times reports, “of the damaging earthquakes it produced in 2006 and 2007.”

Maybe some of these renewables will one day be cheap and reliable. Technological advances will help. But today they are neither cheap nor reliable, and, based on the government’s report, won’t be for another generation.

Until they can compete, the country has to rely on proven sources: fossil fuels and nuclear power. To force cutbacks on these so that renewables can get a bigger market share, and to continue to fund projects with public money, is foolish and irresponsible.

This is a huge waste of tax payer dollars, something that Congress is very good at. Spain, by the way, promised millions of “green jobs” but instead saw only increases in the unemployed, once again proving that if one listens very closely to what the liberals recommend, and then does the exact opposite, things will usually work out much better. Spain’s quest to be “green” has destroyed their economy. Cap and trade schemes have crippled the entire European Union, as well.

It would be one thing if the United States wasn’t sitting on massive oil reserves, reserves that rival the biggest oil producing nations, as well as a century’s worth of natural gas, and several hundred years worth of coal. But we are, and it’s criminal that we aren’t using these resources.

As a practical matter, anyone care to guess what the effect of keeping an extra $700 billion to $1 trillion in the American economy would do for the American people? How about how it would effect state sponsors of terror, who rely on American dollars to fund these efforts?

But of course, there is major corruption going on in these industries, and, as usual, you can trace this back to Barack Obama and his puppet master, former Nazi collaborator, and multi-billionaire, George Soros. Soros, the self proclaimed “owner of the democrat party,” funds many of the left wing organizations that drive the democrat/communist party machine. They are truly too many to mention, but groups like MoveOn.org, and even ACORN benefit from his billions. Suffice it to say, if there is a prominent democrat/communist cause, or group, you will find Soros involved.

With that kind of money comes power and influence. And Soros wields incredible influence over his hand picked puppet, Barack Obama. Back in August the big talk was Petrobas, and the huge deal Obama made with the Brazilian Oil Giant. Obama “loaned” Petrobas $10 billion American tax payer dollars so they could drill offshore, something Obama and his thugs fight tooth and nail against in our own country.

America is rich in oil, right off our own coast line, but we are told we will literally destroy the world, and all of mankind, plus all of the fishes in the sea, and the polar bears, of course, if we dare to drill for that oil.

This made me wonder why, if drilling for our oil would be such a disaster, could one drill off the coast of Brazil without such harmful effects. Are the waters magical down there? Is there some sort of fairy dust that floats in the air that keeps the evil oil companies from destroying everything? Nope, turns out the answer is a lot simpler, and well, a lot more predictable.

You see literally just days before our most corrupt president in the nation’s history was so generous with our money, his boss, George Soros, became the major stockholder in Petrobas! In fact, it became Soros’ largest holding. Funny how having Soros involved made all of the environmental concerns go away, huh? You can read more, including a statement from Sarah, here.

But wait, there’s more! Remember the Copenhagen sham of a conference? Well, our buddy George was over there as well, causing all sorts of problems for those who wish to bring clean, and dare I say “green” natural gas to market. Under the guise of “saving the planet” Soros, and his enablers, sought to block all efforts.

Energy: An oil company wants to invest its profits in clean-burning American natural gas. A Hungarian billionaire and a “green” politician want to stop it. This is the real Climate-gate scandal.

While the greenies of the world united in Copenhagen to talk about the weather, emitting a Third World-country-size chunk of greenhouse gases to gather there, the world’s largest oil company, Exxon Mobil, was doing something about it.

On Dec. 14, Exxon agreed to buy XTO Energy, a natural gas firm, in a deal valued at $41 billion. XTO is one of the leaders in something called “fracking” technology, in which water, sand and additives are pumped into the ground to unlock trillions of feet of natural gas previously thought to be unobtainable.

This is what energy companies really do with their profits. They find more energy, then sell it to you.

While the technique is not new, the technology exploiting it is.

XTO has helped develop new technologies that let it drill a single well 9,000 feet and then bore horizontally through shale formations to unlock the natural gas trapped in the porous rock. The rock is fractured and the gas is pushed into accessible pockets whence it can be extracted with a minimal surface footprint.

Because of these new technologies, it is estimated that the U.S. sits on 83% more recoverable natural gas than was thought in 1990.

The Barnett Shale rock formations of Texas and Louisiana, the Bakken Shale formation in Montana and North Dakota, and the Marcellus Shale formation running through New York and Pennsylvania and other states may hold as much as 2,000 trillion cubic feet of this clean-burning, domestically produced fuel.

We are the Saudi Arabia of shale.

At current use, we have an estimated 90-year supply, if we are allowed to get at it.

Slam dunk? Hardly. Rep. Ed Markey, D-Mass., one of the sponsors of the job- and economy-killing Waxman-Markey cap-and-trade bill and no fan of domestic energy, wants to hold hearings on the alleged environmental dangers of the new technology.

There’s been an organized campaign to discredit fracking as an environmental danger to the nation’s water supply. Ed Lasky at American Thinker has traced a tangled web of deception that rivals the “hide the decline” campaign by the University of East Anglia’s Climate Research Unit.

A media group called Pro Publica has done what it calls “investigative journalism” and exposed the alleged dangers of fracking in a series of stories it has provided free to cash-starved media outlets and newspapers. The first expose was an attack on energy companies developing the Marcellus Shale.

Pro Publica was started by billionaires Herbert and Marion Sandler, who, along with billionaire George Soros, funded the left-wing Center for American Progress, run by John Podesta and touted as the Obama administration’s “idea factory.”

Soros owns a major stake in a company called InterOil, a company that has discovered a large natural gas field in Papua, New Guinea, with which American shale resources would compete.

Soros would rather have us import his liquefied natural gas than develop our own. His allies in the media, the environmental movement and the Democratic caucus are all too eager to exploit public fears to do it.

Roger Willis owns a hydraulic fracturing company in the Pennsylvania town of Meadville. He says thousands of frack jobs have been done in rock formations above and below the Marcellus Shale in New York state with no aquifer damage.

“This 60-year-old technique has been responsible for 7 billion barrels of oil and 600 trillion cubic feet of natural gas,” according to Sen. James Inhofe, ranking member of the Environment and Public Works Committee. “In hydraulic fracturing’s 60-year history, there has not been a single documented case of contamination.”

Whether some are trying to hide the decline in global temperatures or the abundance of clean-burning domestic natural gas, it’s a scandal. If we’re serious about both carbon emissions and energy independence, let’s stop this nonsense and get the fracking gas.

Another story, another corrupt democrat/communist, and another case for severely limiting the amount of time one can “serve their country” in Washington. Let’s face it, crooks and usurpers like Gore, Obama, and Soros would have a harder time influencing policy if Congress worked as the founders intended, and actual citizens served a term or two, and then went home, forced to live under the laws, and conditions, they help to create. But that’s another story for another day.

I know this started out as a discussion of energy and national security, but as one sees, all of this is intertwined. As they say, “it’s complicated!”

Doesn’t have to be though, that’s for damned sure! First, we must get rid of the corruption in Washington, no matter how hard it is, how much time and effort it takes. We all know this entire global warming scam is nothing more than a way for a select few to enrich themselves on the backs of normal hard working people world wide. Greed and corruption has been with us since the beginning of time, but the current president and Congress have certainly set the bar at a whole new level for future politicians to shoot for.

Heads need to roll and jail cells need to be filled. Say,…. maybe we CAN buy that prison in Chicagoland after all. That way Obama will feel at home while he serves out his sentence after he is convicted of his High Crimes and Misdemeanors. He will have a lot of company there if we do this right! Gore could be his cell mate!

Next we need to look at the suggestions that Sarah Palin has been making for years now. Sarah has an incredible commonsensical approach to the whole problem that will work. Obviously, we need an “all of the above” approach to the energy issues at hand. And well, we also would like to have clean energy, please.

We are now spending not millions, not billions, but trillions of dollars, amounts of money that are so large that no one can really comprehend fully them. Obama and his corrupt Congress have spent more money in one year than all of our previous presidents and congresses have in the nation’s 233 year history, COMBINED! For what? For failed programs that do little but put us further in debt, and cost more jobs. Nothing is created, we might as well just pile the money up and burn it. At least it would keep us warm this winter!

For what we are throwing away on all of these idiotic programs we could start a crash program that would guarantee energy independence, and our national security for the foreseeable future. We need a program similar to the one that saw us go from small rockets that blew up more often than not, to walking on the surface of the moon, in less than a decade. We need a serious “all of the above” approach.

We have the oil, and we know how to get it. Stop the bureaucratic nonsense and “drill baby drill” make it a matter of national security, and tell all of the crazed groups who would try and stop it through law suits, and what have you, to go take a powder.

Next, get that natural gas to market, and instead of wasting efforts on silly things like electric cars, work on converting the fleet to natural gas. I could write a book on why natural gas is the right solution for much of our automotive needs, but will save that for later. Suffice it to say, for now, that this is well proven technology. The Big 3 automakers, Ford, GM, and Chrysler, have made cars, trucks, and buses that run on compressed natural gas (CNG) for decades. With today’s engine management technology, coupled with exciting new things like direct injection for gasoline engines, the time is right to move from using gasoline exclusively for motorfuel. As a bonus, diesel engines can be converted to run, and run well, on CNG too. Natural gas burns very cleanly and would reduce (actual) harmful emissions greatly as well as extending engine life.

What people forget about electric cars is the fact that the have been around since the invention of the automobile. They were actually relatively popular in the early years, especially among women, as the first Model T Fords were a serious pain to drive, and maintain. By the 1920’s though, the manufacturers,, and the public, came to realize they just weren’t the practical solution to transportation needs. Ever since, a dedicated few have sought to prove the consensus wrong. The results:

After billions spent, and Lord knows how many attempts, the mechanics of it all, and the results are really no different than the were 100 years ago. An all electric vehicle is still no more practical. It still has a very limited range of travel, top speed, and driveability. Oh, and they cost a lot of money, and since they must be plugged in to the existing electrical grid, they use the same “dirty” electricity that all of the greens are losing their minds over today!

Oh sure, you can buy a hybrid, but they are underpowered, overpriced, and only work because they also have a gasoline engine for when you actually want to drive them somewhere. Other than making yourself feel better, and lightened your bank account unnecessarily, you’ve accomplished absolutely nothing. Oh, and those batteries? Major environmental hazzards. Wait till the landfills start filling up with those deals. Talk about pollution!

Natural gas fixes this problem. It’s proven technology that’s been with us for decades. It works, and would take minimal effort to get the infrastructure in place to make it happen. Many larger municipalities already run most of their city owned fleet on CNG, and other countries have retail outlets that dispense the product, such as this one in the Czech Republic:

Of course, any discussion that talks energy, must talk nuclear. We must do it. France gets nearly 80 percent of it’s electricity from nuclear energy. France! If France can do it, the United States, the most powerful nation on earth, most certainly can.

It always amuses me: We actually aid rouge nations, nations who want to develop nuclear weapons to destroy the world, by helping them set up civilian nuclear plants “to generate electricity,” and yet, we are absolutely verboten from building our own cheap, safe, and really clean sources of nuclear power. It is the very definition of insanity.

Again, move the enviro-nuts out of the way and start expediting the process. Instead of wasting billions on “cash for clunkers” or trillions trying to destroy the best health care system on the planet, lets make it our goal to get 80 percent of our electricity from nuclear power, in say, a decade!

In the mean time, it is said that we have several hundreds of years worth of coal. It is actually our most plentiful source of energy in this country. It goes without saying that we need to develop clean coal technology to it’s fullest.

Now, while all of this is going on, we absolutely should look at other ways to generate energy, and power our cars and trucks. That quest should never stop. But we need better ideas than what we have now, because so far, we don’t have true workable solutions, solutions that can work in a free market. In other words, solutions that will work without billions, or trillions in tax payer funded subsidies.

Now the other benefit from all of this is Joe Biden’s favorite three letter word “J-O-B-S.” And I’m not talking the Barack Obama style temporary jobs, or jobs in government. I’m talking quality, durable jobs. Jobs that will pay Americans a good wage for a good days work, the kind of jobs that built America in the first place.

Energy is the single most important issue to society in general, and the United States in particular. The entire world runs on energy. We simply can’t function without it. Even more important, something that most folks overlook, even if we stopped using oil today, as a source of fuel, almost every product you use, every medicine you take, has some form of petroleum in it’s base. Oil isn’t going away!

We need to get serious for many reasons. A realistic energy policy, one like Sarah Palin has been touting for years, will not only give us economic security, but security from terrorism, as well. It will make America independent and able to look out for her own interests rather than having to bow before ruthless dictators world wide, just to keep the flow of our economy’s lifeblood coming. We will no longer fund terror, and we will no longer have to be gentle with nation states who continue to sponsor terror.

A coherent and comprehensive energy policy will create millions upon millions of well paying, durable jobs, for generations to come. The push to attain this goal will stimulate our economy right now, and create real jobs, right now.

Here is the latest polling from Battleground. This comes right on the heels of Gallop polling that also shows the majority of Americans consider themselves conservative. This is no fluke either. And as much as we’d love to say that Obama is driving people away from his and his party’s rapidly dying ideology, the truth is Battleground polling, since 2002, has consistently found similar results. Battleground, a bipartisan polling group, has a record of being very accurate.

Bruce Walker over at the American Thinker has some great analysis:

The Battleground Poll and the Battle for America

There’s good news for conservatives in the latest Battleground Poll. The political implications are profound…if the already-energized conservative base takes even more initiative.

In August 2008, I wrote an article on “The Biggest Missing Story in Politics.” The article explains that conservatives are an overwhelming majority of America. One year later, I wrote an update on that theme, this time based on the Gallup Poll which showed that conservatives outnumber liberals in virtually every state in the union. I have been writing about the remarkable Battleground Poll results in many articles for many years.

The Battleground Poll reveals the internals of its poll. It also asks respondents the same demographic questions in each poll: What is your education level? What is your age? What is your religious affiliation? What is your marital status? Question D3 asks respondents to describe their ideology. The choices are “very conservative,” “somewhat conservative,” “moderate,” “somewhat liberal,” “very liberal,” and “unsure/refused.” Those asked by the Battleground Poll — if they dislike the liberal label — can call themselves moderates, they can refuse to answer, and they can express an uncertainty about their ideology. Only those certain of their ideology and willing to label themselves are considered conservative in the poll.

The Battleground Poll is not a Republican polling organization. It is, rather, one of the few bipartisan polling organizations. Republican and Democrat pollsters agree on the language of the questions for respondents, so that the questions asked are not only fairly worded, but unusually fairly worded. Republican and Democrat pollsters agree on the population sample, so that polls results are not skewed because too many Democrats, too many Republicans, or too many independents are included. The Battleground Poll also has proven very accurate over many elections.

The responses to Question D3 have been remarkably consistent. Respondents have changed dramatically about what they thought of President Bush or of the state of the economy or the most important issues facing our nation. Respondent may swing quite a bit about which party they support or trust the most. But in one single area of this long list of polling data, the American people have not wavered at all from Battleground Poll to Battleground Poll: About sixty percent of the American people, in poll after poll, year after year, describe themselves as “conservative.”

On December 16, 2009, Battleground released its latest poll. In this one, 63% of the American people described themselves as “very conservative” or “somewhat conservative.” The rest of America — not just liberals, but moderates and people who were unsure about their ideology or chose not to respond to that question, totaled only 37% of America. A measly one percent of Americans called themselves moderates; 25% of Americans called themselves “somewhat liberal“; and 8% of Americans called themselves “very liberal.”

This is no aberration. Consider in Battleground Poll results since June 2002 the percentage of Americans who have described themselves as conservative: June 2002 (59%), September 2003 (59%), April 2004 (60%), June 2004 (59%), September 2004 (60%), October 2005 (61%), March 2006 (59%), December 2007 (58%), July 2007 (63%), May 2008 (62%), August 2008 (60%), September 2008 (59%), and October 2008 (56%).

In the November 2008 Battleground Poll, for the first and only time, the straight question of “conservative” or “liberal” was not posed to respondents. Instead, the poll asked respondents two separate questions: fiscal ideology was asked in Question D6 and social ideology was asked in Question D7. The Battleground Poll clearly intended to refine Question D3. What were the results? Fiscal conservatives in Question D6 were 69% of respondents. Social conservatives were 53% of respondents and social liberals were 39%. While that sounds like social conservatism is a weak link, that is misleading: a whopping 34% of all Americans described themselves as “very conservative” on social issues, by far the largest very intense group in any Battleground Poll.

What does this mean for American politics today? It ought to boldly empower conservatives. The “right,” which every Democrat leader reflexively attacks whenever political opposition to his plans grows strong, boasts the overwhelming majority of Americans. This explains why the left’s ballot initiatives in California last year failed, in some cases, in every single county of the state and why the gay marriage ballot measure failed in liberal Maine. This also explains why Obama runs away from “labels” (all leftists do, and have for many years).

What it means in politics is that any true conservative against a true leftist should carry every state and win by a landslide. But it means more than that. Conservatives in the areas of culture, media, entertainment, and education are treated like unwanted stepchildren, or worse (despite the fact that conservatives on average are better-educated than liberals).

The worst victims of invidious bigotry in America today are conservatives. Only a tiny percentage of professors are conservative. The same is true for government-supported media like NPR, Corporation for Public Broadcasting, and the National Endowment for the Arts. Libraries are dominated by the minority left. How different would America be if fifty or sixty percent of teachers, librarians, professors, public media producers, and staff in government-supported organizations were conservative?

That ought to be a goal for conservatives. Winning elections is fine, but how much more vital is it for us to recover at least an equal voice in colleges, media, schools, libraries, and entertainment? What is wrong with us, the overwhelming majority of Americans, demanding not to be consigned to a ghetto or treated by Jim Crow standards? We begin by pointing out the obvious: conservatives are the majority of Americans, but we are almost invisible in our public and private institutions of education, information, entertainment, and study.

Then demand that those who want our tax dollars, our commercial business, our donations — anything, really, from us — treat us fairly, portray us honestly, and invite us into the halls of influence. It is a modest demand, but it is very important. It is a cultural “game-changer,” and that, more than anything, is what we need.

Walker nails it here. This is more than just about who wins elections. This polling shows that conservatism is greatly under represented in this country. The implications, for business, media, entertainment, and marketers are incredible.

Let’s take the media first. It’s no secret that liberals make up the bulk of those who choose “journalism” as their career. Even at the so-called “Republican” Fox News, liberals far out number conservatives on the payroll. Everywhere else, conservatives are almost non-existent.

Oh sure, every network and big newspaper has their “token conservative.” They all have their David Brooks or David Frums. But none are actually conservative. Most are “progressives” masquerading as conservatives. Is it any wonder that the newspaper industry is collapsing and the two cable news networks that aren’t Fox are going virtually unwatched?

A smart operator would shake things up and get back to being a news agency rather than a shill for the democrat/communist party. Their profits would soar, and America would be better for it.

The same goes for Hollywood. You ever notice that when Tinseltown makes a movie or television show that is family friendly that folks flock to them in droves? Shows like American Idol and Dancing With The Stars are huge hits because they appeal to a conservative audience. Now that’s not to say every show should be a version of these two, but it shows that Americans enjoy more wholesome fare than what they are generally served up.

Frankly, I enjoy films and shows that are considered “edgy.” There is absolutely a place for these sort of things. Where Hollywood loses me is when they turn otherwise entertaining and delightful movies and TV shows into nothing more than vehicles for liberal propaganda.

One has to look no further than the NBC/Universal to see this on display. Although under new management, NBC/Universal is the poster child for unrelenting propaganda. Owned by General Electric, whose CEO is an adviser to Barack Obama, NBC/Universal has pushed the global warming hoax to the max for years, going so far as having “green weeks” where all of their shows, and entertainment work the global warming shtick into the story line.

NBC uses their long running series Law and Order to bash conservatives, Christians, gun owners, pro-life advocates, and so on. Portraying them as evil and unstable.

It’s easy to see the motivation behind Law and Order. They despise conservatives and use tactics right out of Saul Alinsky’s Rules in order to demean and marginalize the object of their scorn. While the far left eat this up, conservatives, by nature, are too timid to act. This needs to change, and change big time.

Of course, for GE, it’s all about the money. NBC pushes “green” as much as possible because GE makes most of the implements of this movement. By hammering viewers constantly with propaganda, they hope to convince people to fall for the global warming scam. Hundreds of billions of dollars are riding on this deal for GE alone. Big Global Warming, if not stopped, will be a trillion dollar industry built on the back of the American people.

Again, smart operators in the entertainment industry would take a pass on all of the propagandizing and get back to just entertaining. The ones who do that will have great success and loyal viewers.

Now this is not to say that TV shows shouldn’t have messages built in. The greatest movie ever made, Casablanca, is one of the most patriotic films ever made. Whether it was intentional or by accident, this movie stirs great emotions, even to this day.

Years ago, television was leading the way with socially relevant programming. TV tackled tough subjects like racism and sexism. Important issues of the day and issues Americans agreed needed addressing. That was responsible and appropriate. What we see now is just pushing an agenda that most of the country doesn’t care for.

Liberals always have to force their agenda on the people, because few would willingly submit.

With all of that said, this has the greatest implications for the Republican Party. The Party is in shambles. For decades the so-called “moderates” have attempted to marginalize conservatives, and conservatism. It’s why they are completely out of power in Washington.

The country club, blue blood, Rockefeller Republicans, the RINOs and DIABLOs (Democrats In All But Name Only) are, and always have been, “progressives.” This is worse than liberal, and frankly all of us are guilty of labeling “progressives” as liberals. The “progressive” movement goes all of the way back to Teddy Roosevelt, a Big Government Statist. “Progressives” totally control the democrat/communist party.

Conservatives, when in power within the Republican Party, have always come out as winners. One has to look no further than the Great Ronald Reagan, who won two unprecedented landslide elections to the presidency, to see that conservatism is attractive to the American people.

We are seeing the same sort of buzz around Sarah Palin, an unapologetic conservative icon. Not since Reagan has a single politician truly aroused the American people.

Oh sure, Barack Obama achieved pop star status, but it was all smoke and mirrors. There was absolutely no substance. In fact, as it is now painfully clear, Obama had to lie about his actual agenda in order to win the election. Obama had to work over time to keep his radical associations from derailing his run for office. Of course, he had plenty of accomplices in the willing media to carry his water and hide the real Barack Obama. Now that he is in, the American people are mortified by the incredible mistake that was made. The American people are horrified now that any pretense that Obama isn’t an out and out communist is gone.

Bounce this off of Sarah Palin’s incredible popularity. Unlike Obama, she actually has decades of experience as an executive level leader. She has an actual public record, going back 20 years, that can be examined by all. She is quick to state her position on any given subject, and all one has to do is look back at her actual record as a public servant to see that she’s pretty consistent in her beliefs and agenda. In other words, if she is saying it now, she has a record of doing before. She doesn’t have to hide behind trickery and the slight of hand. She is what she is.

Sarah doesn’t have to hide from the American people who she is. She is genuine. In this way, Sarah Palin is just like Ronald Reagan: Outspoken and unabashedly conservative. People see this, and respond favorably.

The implications for the Grand Old Party are many, and great, but the biggest is the myth that the GOP needs to “moderate it’s message” to win elections. The current GOP wisdom, or what passes for it, is that we need to pander to the oh so precious “moderate” vote to win. (A whopping 1 percent of the population, according to this poll!) That we need to be a “big tent party” to regain power. The end result is a party that is nothing more than democrat/communist light.

Yes, there are differences in the parties, but on many issues top candidates from our party sure sound a lot like the democrat/communists, and certainly vote with them in their misguided effort to be bipartisan. Our last presidential candidate made one of his center piece talking points the fact that he was known for “reaching across the aisle.” You see where that got us! And I’m not just talking about the election!

Conservatism is the big tent. Always has been. In 1984 Reagan won crushing victories in 49 states by governing as a true conservative in his first term. A feat that hasn’t been, and may never be, duplicated. Running as an unbridled conservative, Reagan “only” won 44 states in 1980.

If you look around at the current political landscape, all of the stars are unabashedly conservative. Sarah Palin, Michelle Bachmann, Rick Perry, Jim DeMint, James Inhofe, Michael Williams, and Lt Col. Allen West are all solid conservatives and not afraid to say so.

Speaking of Michael Williams:

Williams is the Railroad Commissioner of Texas, a very powerful job, that among other things, regulates energy in Texas. Hmmm…..Sarah Palin had a powerful job in Alaska doing pretty much the same thing!

Williams is wildly popular in Texas, and a shoe-in to take Kay Baily Hutchison’s seat, giving Texas an actual conservative in the Senate for the first time, in some time. Make sure you check out his You Tube channel that is filled with inspiring speeches.

Then you have Lt Colonel Allen West, from Florida, who is running for Congress:

This is the message of conservatism. This is the message of liberty and freedom. This is the message of America. One of the most powerful speeches you’ll see.

The video below is what is considered the best speech given by any leader since Ronald Reagan’s iconic 1964 address to the Republican National Convention. In this speech Sarah Palin solidified her position as the new leader of the conservative movement:

Of course, the original is still the blueprint for greatness in America. I’ve always considered this “must see TV” and go so far as to say that schools need to teach an entire subject based on this speech alone, and no one should graduate high school without a working knowledge of it’s concept.

It’s amazing how much of what Reagan had to say still applies today. It’s chilling what decades of liberal control of our culture has done to us, as a nation. The destructive nature of liberalism is seen all over the fruited plain. It touches our lives daily. It makes our lives just a little less whole, just a little less free.

Few, if any, in Washington get it. Our nation has been taken over by the most radical elements on earth. Vicious elements that have no problem using brute force, as well as trickery and deceit, to see their agenda prevail.

Liberty and freedom are the enemy of the liberal movement. The current communists in Washington are the enemies of liberty and freedom. They only bring tyranny and oppression to the table. The opportunity is ripe for true conservative leaders to step forward and assume the mantle of freedom and liberty, of the American way.

America sorely needs conservatives to answer the call at every level We need conservatives to step up to the plate in local and national races. We need conservatives to seek careers in education, journalism, and the arts. Most importantly we need conservatives to stand up and speak out. You are by far the majority in this nation, it’s about time you realize this, and no longer remain passive, no longer remain silent.

America is a conservative nation and it’s time that our conservative nature is both respected, and celebrated. It’s time for our government to respect the will of the people. It’s our duty to replace those that won’t, with those that will.

Whew! Man, that Sarah Palin sure has started a real firestorm now that she has attacked the Holy Church of Global Warming! It’s one thing to knock ObamaCare on it’s backside, there are only billions of dollars in payoffs and corruption riding on that deal. But the global warming hustle truly is the whole enchilada!

Not billions, but trillions of dollars will change hands. Government control like you’ve never even dreamed of will come to pass. Taxes will flow into incompetent government hands like never before. Energy will “necessarily skyrocket.”

Of course, the real story is all of the money that will be made trading “carbon credits.” Al Gore, the Bernie Madoff of the climate change movement, has made hundreds of millions of dollars already off this scam, and stands to make billions.

As I wrote in an earlier piece, Obama and his friends also stand to make out like bandits if cap and trade laws are enacted. The Chicago Climate Exchange is already up and running, and ready to go when all of these insane laws are enacted. Of course, being Chicago, there is absolutely, positively no corruption going on with this deal. Uh huh. There’s this bridge for sale that you just must see if you believe that one!

Just to bring everyone up to speed. If you remember the failed, disgraced Governor from California, Arnold Schwarzenegger, decided to go off on Sarah for her resent stance on the hoax, the greatest lie ever told. Sarah, in what is her usual style, fired right back with this:

Greener Than Thou?

Why is Governor Schwarzenegger pushing for the same sorts of policies in Copenhagen that have helped drive his state into record deficits and unemployment? Perhaps he will recall that I live in our nation’s only Arctic state and that I was among the first governors to create a sub-cabinet to deal specifically with climate change. While I and all Alaskans witness the impacts of changes in weather patterns firsthand, I have repeatedly said that we can’t primarily blame man’s activities for those changes. And while I did look for practical responses to those changes, what I didn’t do was hamstring Alaska’s job creators with burdensome regulations so that I could act “greener than thou” when talking to reporters.

– Sarah Palin

BOOM, taste my nightstick! (What!?! You KNOW we’re gonna go to that one early and often!)

Sarah has what is probably the most reasonable stance there is on the whole notion of climate change. Being someone in a position of power she honestly didn’t have the luxury to just call these liars out and blow them off. And, as someone who spent time as her state’s chief energy and environmental regulator, Sarah knows more than the average politician and humble blogger about the subject.

Climate change may be happening, but the climate on earth has a history of changing. The earth is millions of years old, for goodness sake! We’ve had heat waves and ice ages. All before man even existed! Obviously if the entire earth was covered in ice, and we now have places where it is not, there was some significant warming.

Anyhow, one failed California Governor pwned.

But why did Arnold even bother to speak up? What prompted all of this? Well, as always, follow the money! Our friend and colleague, The Might Serf, went to town on this one and found some fascinating information:

Schwarzenegger vs. Palin: Arnold has no credibility

In an interview with George Stephanopoulos, from the COP15 Climate Summit in Copenhagen, Governor Schwarzenegger took a swipe at Governor Palin. He was asked about her editorial published in the Washington Post last week. He replied:

“You have to ask: what was she trying to accomplish? Is she really interested in this subject or is she interested in her career and in winning the nomination? You have to take all these things with a grain of salt.”

Tack on “mind reader” to Arnie’s long list professional talents…

Not only is that conjecture on his part, it’s also a convenient way to avoid the subject matter and deal with what she said. Arnold deflects the debate, as is common with the global warming faithful and turns it into a ‘what’s Palin going to do next’ moment.

Then he goes on to say:

“We in California have proven it over and over that you can protect the economy, and you can protect the environment.” …

“I don’t think you have to choose. I think it is nonsense talk to say let’s talk first about the economy.”

Either Arnold needs advisors that don’t lie to him or he has a serious literacy issue. The last time I checked, the statewide California unemployment rate was at 12.3 percent. With the highest rated area, a town about forty minutes east of where I’m sitting, called El Centro at 22.6 percent.

The report goes on to say:

As a Californian who happens to believe that we are in a current trend of “global cooling” (and yes, lefties that also is a “change” in climate) and also someone forced to live under the green foot of my state government, I got a little more joy from that post than some.

She correctly points out the economic mess California is in and accurately points to one of the main culprits. Arnold keeps talking about these “green jobs” (sounds familiar) but when you look at the numbers I posted above, the small number of positions that open up in the market aren’t enough to even put a small dent into those figures.

When my car can run off of algae, we may see a boost in the green economy. Until then, realize what makes an economy work and what doesn’t. Like new regulations and laws for instance… Those are instant job killers. If you mandate small businesses that are already stretched too thin, they will lay off workers. They don’t have a choice. In business, you do whatever it takes to make it to the next month.

Schwarzenegger is now one of the most outspoken global warming alarmists in public office today. He has dramatically steered this state toward more “green” centered policies, programs, and worst of all, mandates. So did he have an epiphany? Did his wife’s family convince him over turkey dinner during the holidays?

Probably not, but I believe Robert Kennedy, his wife’s cousin, has everything to do with Arnold’s conduct in regards to environmental policies.

Robert Kennedy is not only the governor’s relative but he is also one of Arnold’s closest advisors, even if he does serve in an unofficial capacity. The two of them can be seen at various press announcements and environmental meetings talking about their great plans to reconstruct California into a “green economy.”

There’s just one problem with that… A slight conflict of interest arises when one looks over the contracts and plans Californians will be forking money over for in these deals. Robert Kennedy is a Venture Partner and Senior Advisor for a company called VantagePoint Venture Partners. VantagePoint has a multimillion-dollar stake in a company called BrightSource, who produces solar technology. BrightSource has lobbied to build a massive energy project in the Mojave Desert. The project would provide power to 142,000 homes and cost about $2 billion. BrightsSource hopes to build three solar-powered plants situated on land near the Nevada-California borders. As Schwarzenegger told a joint conference of Mexican and U.S. governors, “They’re going to blanket the world with solar panels.”

Last year Governor Schwarzenegger also announced a plan to build a massive electric vehicle grid that would cover most of California. At the press conference in San Francisco, Robert Kennedy said “Creating an energy-independent economy is our generation’s moon-shot.” Whatever “moon-shot” means, I don’t know but I don’t like it. He also said “For too long we’ve believed that economy and environment stood at odds with each other. By coming together in this time of turmoil to build a clean transportation infrastructure, this generation will fuel the economic and environmental prosperity of generations to come.” Given the fact that Robert attended that conference as a representative of VantagePoint, you better believe they are looking to rake in millions from the deal.

In fact, there is an overwhelming amount of information out there that points to Governor Schwarzenegger’s real motives in pushing a “green” economy. It’s all about money and it has little to do with the environment. As is usually the case when it comes to the big names in the Climate Change “movement.” Just do a quick search into Al Gore’s finances to see how philanthropic that guy really is. I’ll go out on a limb here and call the man a profiteer.

As far as Governor Palin’s motives behind publishing words of warning and giving Obama advice (good advice) on environmental matters… She’s trying to help the country. Nothing else. She has no financial ties or personal ties to an industry that stands to heavily profit from the outcome of the Copenhagen Summit. In fact, I’ve done a lot of research into Governor Palin’s background and connections… I’ve linked her up to the Rotary Club and the NRA. That’s it.

Regular readers of this website will recognize the name Annenberg Foundation straightaway. This is the very same Annenberg Foundation that gave the unrepentant murdering domestic terrorist William Ayers, and his good old buddy Barack Obama $60 million dollars for “education,” which Ayers and Obama then in turn gave to radical groups like ACORN, you know, “for the children.”

Look, Schwarzenegger is married to a “Kennedy.” That alone makes him suspect on many levels, but it’s not really all that hard to figure out what is going on here.

Whole lot of corruption goin’ on ‘round here!

Now….As we talked about before, Sarah’s two Op-Eds she wrote for the Washington Post were some of the most read of the entire year. The one she wrote in July on the subject of global warming was the third most read. Predictably, the loons have lost their minds over this! In the world of the democrat/communist, dissenting thought, and differences of opinion, simply are not tolerated, and most certainly not written.

The Washington Post has, of course, been savaged for allowing that woman to sully the pages of their fine paper. The reaction by the crazies has been hilarious, well worth the time to observe. These people’s entire lives are based on lies, and they can’t justify themselves. Liberalism is one of those things that simply cannot withstand the light of day, or hockey moms from Wasilla, Alaska.

So, WaPo trots out their resident hack, Eugene Robinson, to satisfy the moonbats. What could go wrong?

Sarah, obviously loving this little exchange, offered this up for the WaPo, as well as all of her Facebook supporters:

I’d like to thank Eugene Robinson for highlighting Alaska’s achievements on climate change [“Palin’s own ‘Climate- gate,’” op-ed, Dec. 15] and for noting that I’ve “treated the issue as serious, complex, and worthy of urgent attention,” while making “any number of pragmatic, reasonable, smart decisions as governor.” But he’s wrong to suggest that my views have somehow changed or that now I’ll have to “renounce” my past efforts.

Once again: I don’t deny that climate change is real. In creating a sub-cabinet to deal specifically with the issue, I said that “Alaska’s climate change strategy must be built on sound science and the best available facts and must recognize Alaska’s interest in economic growth and the development of its resources.” That goal made sense to me then, and it makes sense to me now.

Mr. Robinson tries to make hay out of the fact that I asked the group to advise me regarding opportunities to participate in “carbon-trading markets.” But considering voluntary participation in carbon-trading programs is much different from endorsing the economically disastrous cap-and-tax proposals put forward by Democrats in Washington. Those proposals will burden our job creators and raise energy prices for all of us, and that’s why I oppose them.

As governor of Alaska, I sought common-sense solutions that took real-world costs and benefits into account. That’s what I’m looking for now. But that’s not what’s on the table in Washington or in Copenhagen.

Sarah Palin, Wasilla, Alaska

BOOM, taste my nightstick!

Obviously, Sarah has hoisted this entire bunch of nimrods by their own petards. It’s glorious to watch a politician who will actually fight back when these liars in the media and RINOs attack. I certainly wish President George Bush, an honorable and decent man, would have had ½ the spunk this gal from Alaska has. The entire world might be different today. (sigh)

Of course, what’s a good story about taking the global warming hoaxers to the woodshed without some real meat and potatoes. As you know the Climategate scandal was uncovered in Russia where, ironically, their media is open, and relatively honest.

The long and the short of it is best summarized by the Telegraph’s James Dellingpole: “What the Russians are suggesting here, in other words, is that the entire global temperature record used by the IPCC to inform world government policy is a crock.”

That is, we have yet further evidence that the data is being cooked to make the long-running claim of an increase in global temperatures, and now to diminish the apparent cooling of said temps. As the gang at EU referendum tout, “it is in Soviet Union that the CRU, NOAA, NASA show the greatest warming.”

Around the world temperature stations have been widely decommissioned in rural and higher elevations, and we see an over-emphasis on increasingly urbanized (and therefore warmer) stations in the curious selection process as to what temperatures should count, and how much. The latter point references the fact that the data is then adjusted, and we are also seeing an increase in adjusting urbanized (that is, artificially warm) temperature records not down, but upward.

Excerpted in pertinent part, Joe Writes:

On Tuesday, the Moscow-based Institute of Economic Analysis (IEA) issued a report claiming that the Hadley Center for Climate Change based at the headquarters of the British Meteorological Office in Exeter (Devon, England) had probably tampered with Russian-climate data.

The IEA believes that Russian meteorological-station data did not substantiate the anthropogenic global-warming theory. …The data of stations located in areas not listed in the Hadley Climate Research Unit Temperature UK (HadCRUT) survey often does not show any substantial warming in the late 20th century and the early 21st century.

IEA analysts say climatologists use the data of stations located in large populated centers that are influenced by the urban-warming effect more frequently than the correct data of remote stations.

The reason this cherry-picking is relevant — as is the apparent similar gamesmanship being played with other countries examined in recent days including China and New Zealand — because our NOAA compiles the global dataset and the rest work from it. So when CRU claimed that it “lost” its raw data, what they’re saying is the claim to have lost which stations they chose from NOAA’s compilation, making it impossible for those who wish to check it to discern how they got the answer they did.

If it is what it appears to be, and my dozen years working with these people and the past few weeks peeking further inside thanks to ClimateGate tell me that it is, then this is root-cause corruption.

Meanwhile, they are scrambling madly to stitch up an agreement in Copenhagen politically committing the U.S. to the long-desired wealth-transfer. The question is which moves faster, the collapse of the increasingly likely scientific fraud, or the global governance set.

Look, there are a lot of links there, and in incredible amount of information that proves beyond a shadow of a doubt that pretty much all of the information used by the global warming hoaxers is not only faulty, but an absolute lie. You simply must take time to investigate them.

These dishonest scientists have cooked the books, withheld and manipulated data to suit their needs, all in an effort to pull off the greatest scam in history. The greatest lie ever told.

This is the Loch Ness Monster, Big Foot, and UFOs on a global scale! Why? Money, of course. All of these scientists make money off of government and private foundation grants. No crisis, no funding. No funding and you have a lot of “climate scientists” working at McDonald’s asking you if you want fries with that, which is probably where they belong.

And of course, there is power. Look at all of the power that would be wielded if this wasn’t a hoax, and we allowed measures to fight this mythical beast to be put in place. It would be enormous.

The bottom line is this: The climate exists, that’s indisputable. The climate changes, well…duh! Live in Texas and you may see all 4 seasons in one day! That’s real climate change.

But seriously, the climate indeed changes, that’s why the marketing managers over at Big Global Warming, and Big Government, changed the name to “climate change” once it got out that the earth had actually been in a cooling mode since the mid 1990’s. Thus Big Climate was born.

There is no credible data though, that man can cause the climate to change. Now, can man screw up his local environment? You bet’cha! For example, the environmental whack jobs have turned America’s breadbasket, the San Joaquin Valley of California into a desert because of a minnow. Millions of acres of land that used to feed the world, literally, is now a dust bowl, all because man has screwed with nature.

The answer to this sort of thing is to allow the states, not the federal government, to regulate the activities of the insane. This also goes for those who pollute, and well, even litter. We all want a clean world, a healthy world. But we also want a world that places a premium on liberty and freedom. A world were we, the individual, are what matters, not Big Government, Big Climate, Or Big Al Gore.

As the wheels start to come off of the global warming hoax wagon, men like Al Gore, who has bored us to death with his inane braying, need to be rounded up and jailed. The same goes for politicians and officials who have pushed these lies on the world.

There is simply no way to measure the amount of blood and treasure that has been lost in pursuit of this hoax. Industries destroyed, jobs lost, and lives destroyed. We could be talking about trillions of dollars, but how can one even measure the destruction these liars have caused?

Well, for now, we have a few brave souls, like Sarah Palin, who has the power of her position as the true American leader, to take these people and their lies on. Thank God for that.

A friend sent me the photo above a week ago last Saturday under the heading “Sarah enjoying some global warming!” The photo was taken that morning in Fairfax, Virginia as she arrived at one of her huge book signing events. Later that evening she would go on to be a real sensation at the Gridiron Club’s dinner, as one of the keynote speakers, along with Congressman Barney Frank. An event that surprised her critics and wowed her supporters.

Now being the hack that I am, and the global warming hoax being something we have been trying to expose since day one, and of course, knowing Sarah’s own stance on the issue, and well, I knew this photo could see a lot of use!

And why not? This is a great photo!

Well, that kinda became the point, to me.

You see, the more I looked at this photo, the more I realized the photographer had really done something. The photographer had managed to capture the essence of Sarah Palin, the thing that has so many millions admiring her.

Let’s face it, the camera loves Sarah Palin. You rarely find a bad photo of her, but this one hit me as special. The more I looked at the photo, the more the photo kept my attention.

I’ll be straight up here. I look at a lot of photos, every day, of all kinds of things. Most of them I either like, or I don’t. It takes me seconds to figure out if they are keepers, or not. Some hit me as strong and powerful, some just pleasant, funny, or somehow “right” for particular piece I am writing. But this photo stopped me dead in my tracks.

Now let me get the obvious out of the way first: Sarah Palin is a strikingly beautiful woman. In fact, all of the photos from her Fairfax visit have made the guys happy! As you look at this photo, you see that Sarah is really quite a strong figure. Here she is in all black, save the hat, all 5ft 6 inches of her slender frame, looking every bit the fashion model, high heels and all. It’s no wonder that soon after she became Governor of Alaska, Vogue magazine sent a team up there to do a cover shoot with her.

I’m reminded of the popular Alaskan t-shirts and bumper stickers that proudly proclaim “The coldest state, with the hottest Governor!”

All of that was, of course, before Sarah became a national figure. It was OK, even with the dishonest and corrupt national media, to absolutely love Sarah Palin, and salute her as a transformative leader, as long as she stayed in Alaska! But take the girl from the frozen tundra, and all of a sudden this once praised feminist leader, this highly successful wife, mother, reformer, and Governor, becomes “evil!”

Once you realize just how much things have changed in Sarah’s life since the day that Senator John McCain called her and asked if she’d like to help him “change the world” this photo takes on even more meaning. Now like all of us, Sarah’s life wasn’t perfect. She’d had her ups and downs, triumphs and tragedies. But by any measure you want to use, Sarah Palin was, and is, a highly successful woman.

Oh sure, the Alaska Republican Party hates her, with a passion, but that’s because she took many party members down, over corruption. So corrupt that I am reminded of one of the great quotes from Mel Brooks’ original film, The Producers when, at the trial, the jury reads it’s verdict: “We, the people, find the defendants incredibly guilty!” They were that kind of guilty!

So…..some tension was to be expected!

But overall, the Alaskan people were more than just pleased with their choice as Governor. Sarah Palin’s approval rating was in the high 80’s before Obama, Pete Rouse, and the Alaska Mafia started their shenanigans. Again, incredibly successful, by any measure.

Once Sarah was picked as McCain’s running mate though, all that is ugly, vile, and hateful about the left, and they really do have the market cornered on that stuff, came to bear on Sarah. I’ve thought long and hard, and I really cannot think of anyone who has been attacked as viciously as Sarah Palin.

The left attacked Sarah, her husband, her children, especially her youngest son, Trig. In this, the left truly outdid itself. The word evil just doesn’t do some of these people and their attacks justice. And these attacks are ongoing, even to this day.

And yet, after the most concentrated, vile, hate filled attacks on a person we’ve ever witnessed, here is Sarah Palin, this strong and strikingly beautiful woman, out in the snow, in Fairfax, Virginia, loving life to it’s fullest!

You see that all of the lies, hate, filth, and unprecedented attacks on Sarah and her family, have had absolutely no effect on this wonderful woman’s spirit. If anything, they have only strengthened her resolve. Made her a little more powerful. Made her a little more “dangerous” to all of those who hate freedom and liberty. You know, the democrats!

The left, and yes, even some on the right, were stunned when Sarah stepped down as Governor, handing the ball off to her very capable Lt. Governor, Sean Parnell. Some simply didn’t understand what was going on up there in Alaska, even though Sarah’s July 3rd Independence Speech was quite clear about the situation.

When you have a group of people, headed by the President of the United States, out to destroy you, your family, and your state, in any and every way possible, you have two choices: You either allow them to destroy you and everything you love, or you take drastic and dramatic action. And dramatic action is what Sarah took.

For those that don’t know, Pete Rouse, then Barack Obama’s campaign chief-of-staff, and now a White House adviser, not only played an active role in the so-called “Troopergate” witch hunt, or as Sarah calls it “Tazergate,” he had an active role in the rest of the attacks, as well.

When Obama’s thugs failed to destroy Sarah with “Tazergate,” named for the fact that her ex-brother-in-law Trooper Michael Wooten, among other things, tazered his step son, Sarah’s nephew, seemingly for the hell of it, Rouse then worked with the various far left extremists in Alaska, including the bloggers, and other undesirables, to recruit people to continually file bogus ethics complaints, exploiting ethics laws that allow absolutely anyone to complain about anything.

As we know, all of these complaints have been dismissed as unfounded, but in the process, this ran up Sarah’s own personal legal bill to over a half million dollars. The state does not defend it’s executive from bogus attacks. Alaska is unique in this fashion.

Also, unique to the executive is this: While it is against the law to discuss or publicize any of these complaints, until they are resolved, the hate bloggers, Jeanne Devon and Shannyn Moore, who contribute the radical left wing rag, the Huffington Post, along with Linda Kellen Biegel, the democrat/communist party’s “official blogger for Alaska” and various other smear merchants would publish the details of the complaints all over the internet, many times before the complaints were even officially filed.

Of course, the dishonest and corrupt Obamacentric national media would run with these complaints like they had struck gold. All of this illegal under Alaska law, but, and this is what makes the entire ethics process a joke, there is absolutely no punishment for those who break this law. Even better, while one can file complaints willy-nilly against legislators too, if you break any of the laws, like confidentiality laws, the complaint is automatically dismissed and no further consideration given to the complainant. They are protected, but the Governor, and their staff, are not!

But, with all of the personal havoc Obama and his Chicago thug tactics were causing Sarah, that paled to what it was causing the Alaska tax payer. These complaints had basically shut Sarah’s administration down. Her staff spent much of their time dealing with Freedom of Information Act requests, including the well publicized fishing expedition by blogger Linda Kellen Biegel, who talked her readers out of a considerable amount of money so she could pursue all of Sarah’s e-mails, just looking to harass her. So far, that has not been money well spent, but that’s another story.

The bottom line on all of this is, in less than six months, Obama’s Alaska Mafia had cost the Alaska tax payers a whopping $2 million! Basically, these thugs, using typical Chicago, Saul Alinsky tactics, had, up to that point, stolen $2 million from the Alaskan people, and as we looked at it, at the time, reading the leftist blogs, and knowing these online terrorists we going to keep on filing complaints to the bitter end, we figured that these terrorists, and make no mistake, that’s what they are, were on track to cost Alaska’s hard working tax payers as much as $10 million dollars, had she stayed for the last year of her term.

So, to all but the silliest among us, Sarah did the right thing, the honorable thing, and stepped down. Now of course, her critics went into attack mode, how she “quit when the going got tough” and all of that jazz. Since then, every action Sarah has taken, has proven that little theory dead wrong.

In fact, Sarah jumped out of the pan, and into the fire. She has been more outspoken than ever, and more effective, too! As far as I am concerned, the moves by Obama to drive Sarah out of office will go down in history as one of the greatest political and tactical blunders of all time.

As Governor, Sarah was highly restricted. It was hard to leave the state, not only because of the great distances to the lower 48, but also because of the loons who always had a complaint filed when she did. It was impossible for her to write a book, for money, or give paid speeches due to Alaska’s strict rules. Another thing, Obama and his people had turned the once relatively cordial Alaskan political scene into a virtual state of war. So, as Governor, Sarah was careful in her criticism of the Dear Leader.

When you hear Sarah say that “politics changed” once she was chosen by McCain, this is what she is talking about.

We all know, as a private citizen, Sarah has been anything but quiet! She has been a constant thorn in Obama’s side. She has taken on the unconstitutional power grab, disguised as “health care reform” and she has hit Obama on energy policy, and monetary policy. She’s been quoted world wide on all. Recently, her sights have been set on crook, liar, and global warming hoaxer extraordinaire, Al Gore, the Bernie Madoff of the climate change crowd, as the entire global warming hoax collapses at his feet.

Sarah has certainly not run from the fight!

They want me to sit down and shut up. Politically speaking, if I die, I die, but I’ll know that I’ve spoken up. Stand up, speak up and be bold! Screw political correctness, never let them tell you to sit down, never let them tell you to shut up!

___Sarah Palin in her speech introducing Michael Reagan to an audience in Anchorage, Alaska in June, 2009

This brings me back to this simple, but magnificent moment in Virginia, caught on film. When I look at this photo, I see a supremely confident and virile woman. A woman who truly has the bull by the horns. A woman filled with unbelievable vitality. A woman who is in charge. A woman who wields great power.

You know what else I see? I see joy.

Sarah Palin is a happy, joyful woman, and that my friends, is the key to the whole thing. Here is a lady who has had the very worst the hatemongers of the world have to offer up thrown at her. I mean for one year solid the most vile of attacks have come her way. Most people would have stepped back, and maybe went underground for awhile, and certainly, no one could have blamed Sarah had she, herself, taken that route. But obviously, this is a woman who simply isn’t built that way.

Instead, Sarah is the team captain who would lead her high school basketball team to a state championship, playing on a broken ankle, and scoring the final game winning points. This is the young wife who, while working in the rough world of commercial fishing, had an accident that would crush her hand, sending her to the hospital, only to see her return right back to work that day.

This is the PTA mom who thought she could make a difference in her hometown and would eventually turn into a crusader against corruption as both a city councilwoman and two term mayor. This is a woman, who after being appointed the to powerful job as the state’s chief energy and environmental regulator, saw massive corruption not only in the industry she regulated, but within her own political party as well.

Unlike many of those around her, Sarah not only didn’t look away, she actively pursued justice. When it became apparent the sitting Governor, her boss, himself a Republican, would continue to block her efforts to bring those corrupt officials to justice, Sarah did what had to be done. She made the tough choice to resign and as a private citizen, take these people on. This of course, is why she is public enemy number one among the Republican Party “elites” both in Alaska and nationally. She upset a lot of apple carts in her quest to end the corruption. Kept the FBI, the courts, and the prison system in business too!

This would lead Sarah to the Governorship, and her accomplishments as Governor most certainly speak for themselves, as do the consistently high approval ratings. The highest for any Governor in the nation.

In fact, at the height of the attacks by Obama, Inc, just before her resignation, when her approval ratings eventually slipped out of the stratosphere, and came back to more earthly numbers, the left celebrated to no end that she was finally no longer the most popular Governor in America. And all it took was a constant and coordinated effort from the White House and the entire corrupt media, daily, for almost a solid year! When she left office her approval was still about 25 points higher than Obama’s is now! (And he has the most glowing press imaginable)

With all of this going on around her, just how was Sarah able to maintain her strength and remain so joyful about life?

Sarah speaks about her faith in God often. Unlike other politicians who seem to be afraid of becoming labeled as a religious extremist for daring to mention their faith, Sarah readily speaks of the strength and guidance she receives from God’s word, and how this strength and guidance serves her as she goes through life. How this helps her as a leader. As with most Americans, faith is the strong foundation that Sarah builds her life upon.

Sarah recently visited with the Reverend Billy Graham and his son Franklin. During this visit Sarah set down for an interview and discussed how her faith guides her. This is a great interview that you can see here.

It’s very important for a leader to be humble enough to say “I don’t have all of the answers.”

____Sarah Palin

Since leaving office, Sarah has written a best selling book, one that has broken records. The day the book was announced, and online retailers like Barnes&Noble and Amazon offered it up for pre-orders, it became the number one best seller at both retailers, and soon other retailers would see it hit the top of their charts, as well.

The publisher, HarperCollins, has went from an initial printing of 1.5 million, to the announcement that, so far, they have a total of 3 million books ordered for print. They are saying
this is the best selling book of the year. By the way, if you don’t have this book, you really are missing out on something special.

Sarah’s book tour has been nothing short of phenomenal. For the very first stop, in Michigan, people lined up 36 hours ahead of time, just for a spot in line to meet her. They slept outside in cold weather, braved the elements, just for the chance to get a few seconds of time with the Arctic Fox, as well as her autograph, and maybe a handshake. It’s been like this at every stop along the way. Thousands have lined up in support. Most wishing her success if she runs for President of the United States, and many convinced they had just met the next President of the United States!

As Bill O’Reilly put it Monday night on his television show, Sarah has been so successful since steeping down, that she is now running victory laps around her critics!

Part of what brought this out of him was her surprise appearance on the Tonight Show. William Shatner, who has been doing the beatnik gig for decades, doing this sort of thing with popular songs and the like, has poked fun at Sarah by reading her tweets or other pieces of work. This time he set out to give a “reading” from her book. As usual, Shatner was funny. The set up, of course, was Sarah then coming on and turning the tables on Shatner by reading from his book.

The crowd in the audience was unaware, as they had been sequestered during auditions, to make it a true surprise to them, and the audience at home. The roar heard when Sarah took the stage was simply incredible. Of course, her performance was great. Even the far left was going “oh-oh” as they realized they totally misunderestimated her talent. They begrudgingly proclaimed her performance good.

If you haven’t seen it, click here. Sarah also put up some photos on her Facebook page. She was happily entertaining some members of the Wounded Warrior Project backstage. You can view all of those by clicking here.

By the way, that red jacket? That’s the same one she wore for her book cover photo, and the same one she and Laura Ingraham are auctioning off to benefit the Wounded Warrior Project and the Fisher House, two wonderful groups that help our wounded troops and their families.

Leadership is not waiting to see where it’s going. Leadership is making it go somewhere.

____Tammy Bruce

Time and time again Sarah Palin has proven she is a true leader. While other see the problems facing us, they are timid in their actions. It’s tough politically, to be a true leader. You actually have to stand for something. You have to go on record, and in this day and time, that record will follow you. God help you if you change your stance on something, even if it is because you have learned more about something that has caused you to rethink your position!

There is a difference between changing your mind based on new and important information about a subject and flip-flopping with the change of the political winds. But you’ll still catch hell!

When Sarah so eloquently spoke of “death panels” earlier this year she was slammed from every direction. The far left, the squishy Republicans, the media, and the President all pronounced her crazy, and more. Funny thing though, the people understood. One of Sarah’s great strengths is that she can take rather complicated issues and distill them down to a single, simple to understand concepts.

Health care rationing is a grim reality in government run health care. Nameless, faceless bureaucrats, using formulas created by panels of accountants, not doctors, decide who is worthy of the best treatments, and who isn’t. This discussion can get lengthy as one goes through the process governments use to come up with all of this. To say the least, it’s a complicated issue.

“Death panels” really says it all though. It cuts to the chase.

While Sarah was catching hell for all of this, the usual suspects, the so-called Republican leaders, and “2012 front-runners” were hiding under their desks.

This is a pattern that is followed over and over as Sarah speaks out on the most important issues of our time.

In the beginning of a change, the Patriot is a scarce man, brave, hated, and scorned. When his cause succeeds however, the timid join him, for then it costs nothing to be a Patriot.

____Mark Twain

We saw no better example of Mark Twain’s words than the special election held in New York’s 23rd Congressional District earlier this year. No need to rehash the whole affair here, but that was a true stand against the system. You had a backroom deal, not a primary, that put a supposedly “moderate” Republican, who was actually a far left “progressive,” in the running. DeDe Scozzafava was more radical than 43 percent of the democrat/communist party in the New York State Assembly, from where she was plucked!

Enter Doug Hoffman. He was the long shot independent with no hope. The Republican Party considered him a nuisance that would spoil their ideal “moderate” candidate’s chance. He was a spoiler.

A hand full of Conservatives came to support Hoffman. Then came the endorsement from Sarah Palin. Money came pouring in, and immediately Hoffman’s poll numbers increased. In fact, in some polling, Hoffman went from a distant third, to leading. This of course brought national attention to a small, little know race.

Sarah, because she is Sarah, was then vilified by the media and the “good old boy” Republican establishment. She was called every name in the book. The Republican “elites” were losing their minds. Sarah was singlehandedly destroying the Republican Party!

Then a funny thing happened. All of the momentum shifted to Hoffman. It seemed he had a real shot. Even better, DeDe Scozafava, the “moderate” Republican dropped out. At this point support for Hoffman came out of the woodwork. One by one, the so-called leaders all came out from under their desks and jumped on the Hoffman bandwagon. Gutless wonders all.

Whether it’s corruption, health care, energy, monetary policy, Afghanistan, the global warming hoax, or any other pressing matter, Sarah always has the courage to take on the establishment, to speak out. To take a stand while others remain timid.

Hemingway called courage: grace under pressure. Sarah Palin is one of the most courageous politicians in the modern era of American politics.

That’s a lot to get out of one photo, I know, but this is the very essence of Sarah Palin